


Through The Cemetery Backyards

by gerard_needs_to_chill



Category: My Chemical Romance
Genre: Blind Gerard, Body Horror, Creepy, Creepy Gerard, Dead Gerard, Depression, Dreams and Nightmares, Dreams vs. Reality, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Ghosts, Horror, M/M, Psychological Horror, Psychological Trauma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-12
Updated: 2015-02-16
Packaged: 2018-03-12 02:50:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3340826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gerard_needs_to_chill/pseuds/gerard_needs_to_chill
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Blind Gerard Way gets an eye donor, but there is a problem. He starts seeing things he's perhaps not supposed to see...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. We’ve had a bit too many tragedies lately

Darkness. It’s so warm and viscous, but at the same time it makes your skin crawl from the cold and terror which it carries, which it hides under its wing. You want to stay in it forever because you feel safe, but at the same time you are afraid of what lurks under this pitch-black, thick, unbreakable veil. Afraid that something is going to attack you from the back, and you’re going to be powerless against it- just another small, weak, helpless victim. Darkness presses down on your head and your chest, slowly smashing your heart and brains, turning them into a paste. It doesn’t let you breathe properly, wrapping you in it’s overly tight embrace. It kills slowly and sweetly, stretching the pleasure if you, of course, forget to open your eyes.  
  
But darkness is what helps you forget, or at least turn off the screams and wails of what has been clawing on your soul for many, many years. You just lay on your back, pretend you’re dead, and that all your problems are going to be solved by someone else. And this sweetly bitter sensations completely overtake your body, filling you up.  
  
But sometimes the darkness fades, and you are forced to face life just the way it is.  
  
Lucky or not, I don’t have that problem. In my case, the darkness never fades. No matter how many times I open my eyes, all I see is the same unbearable, crushing darkness, which I’m honestly sick of. I’ve gone through so many surgeries, I feel like I’m a robot who is getting modified from day to day. More and more new technologies, traveling from hospital to hospital, operations, scars on my skin… and the light at the end of the tunnel just doesn’t appear.  
  
The last bits of hope that I had all those 10 years ago have completely dissolved by now, and frankly, I have no will to continue living. My innocence is gone, and I can never ever reclaim it, no matter what happens. I’m tired of going with the flow, and I know that I am never going to be able to make anything out of myself. I’m just a waste of flesh and space, a raw human material that had a potential of becoming something, but lost it all.  
  
I do not, however, consider myself a victim. I definitely don’t want anyone to pity me, I don’t need their sorrow. I do not need their prayers either. Why does everyone I meet think it’s appropriate to tell me that they are going to pray for me? What good is it going to do? I stopped believing in God long ago- if he existed, he wouldn’t let anything like this happen. God is supposed to protect, not harm and kill.


	2. Living is easy with eyes closed; misunderstanding's all you see

All the little dirty secrets you are so desperately trying to hide from everyone’s eyes are sooner or later going to escape, and you are no one to prevent it. You may think that you don’t have to ever tell the truth, but you don’t need to speak to give yourself out completely.  
  
I think that if I wasn’t blind, my motto would be something along the lines of “You can achieve anything if you try hard enough”. All the dreams you’ve ever had, all the perfect worlds you’ve imagined- everything is going to collapse one day if you never try. And after that, ‘till the very end of your pathetic life, you’ll constantly pity yourself: “Awh, poor me, why does bad stuff happen to good people?”. Then fate will have even more fun driving you completely and utterly insane, making you miserable, right until you finally press down on the bade hard enough to kill yourself. Only then it will be satisfied. It will make your whole life lower than shit, just adding sprinkles of happiness here and there: it will feed your hope for the better future you want so badly, making you go on for longer. But the future doesn’t get better. Fate just wants to see for how long it can bend you until you finally snap, falling into pieces. Then it will dust the floor from your ashes, vacuum them and move on to another victim. You don’t matter, that’s it. And you probably aren’t even as good as you think you are.  
  
I had another eye surgery half a month ago. I thought I saw a light, or a flash of colour, but it was just my imagination, something from my old memory. When I realised I was still blind, I cried. I didn’t just shed a single tear, I sobbed and wailed on the cold kitchen floor as my mother held me close to her side, her hand smoothing down my hair. My fingers were covered in something sticky and I knew it was my blood, but I didn’t know where it was coming from, and I was too scared to ask.  
  
As I was lying on the kitchen floor wanting to die more than ever before, Mom kept telling me it was okay and that one day I was going to be okay too, but it’s not true. The worst part is that we both know how big of a lie that is, but both of us are scared to admit it aloud. Fate doesn’t forgive- once the victim is chosen, it will not let go until he is crushed into dust. The dust than shall be rolled into a joint and smoked. I heard that when you’re high, you get just crazy torture ideas, and that could be helpful to fate. It’s cruel and wicked. This completely eliminates the idea of “things turning okay once you grow up”.  
  
I sit alone on the carpeted floor in my room, wondering what’s next for me but not wanting an honest answer.  
I run my fingers over the Braille text.  
  
“...Already we knew that there was one room in that region above stairs which no one had seen in forty years, and which would have to be forced. They waited until Miss Emily was decently in the ground before they opened it…”  
  
This book was translated into Braille only by my request- just one copy exists, and I’m the owner. It was a present for my birthday three years ago, when I, quite surprisingly, still had a bit of hope left in me. I reread it every other day, but it carries so many tragic memories that only a cemetery could beat it.  
  
I was in love, or at least I thought I was, with the boy who gave it to me. Three days after my birthday, when I gained enough courage, I naively consulted him about my feelings. I got the reaction I wasn’t expecting; it hit me like a tidal wave, tore my little innocent heart into pieces. The guy didn’t understand. He didn’t understand what it feels like to be blind. He called me a faggot and stormed out. I’m fucking blind, what do I care about gender and looks?  
  
“That’s a rude thing to say to a handicapped person!” you would say, but I’d disagree. It wasn’t about me being blind. I was the one who encouraged him to be open with me in the first place, treat me like he would treat others. And he kept it fair, he kept his promise.  
  
He treated me just like he would treat anyone else, and I do not accuse him of being “not nice towards a blind person”. I accuse him of being a fucking asshole in general.  
  
I need to give him my regards though- he did come to apologise to me several days later, but my mother wouldn’t let him speak to me no matter how many times he asked. At that time, I was thankful for it, but now that I think back to it, I kinda wish she let him see me. I’m intrigued to hear what he had to say to me. Probably some sappy apology. I’d probably pretend like the whole incident didn’t hurt me at all, and we’d be best friends again, but in the back of my mind, I know I wouldn’t be able to forget the pain.  
  
“Living is easy with eyes closed”, John Lennon once said. Well, I’d want to see the motherfucker try to live a life with fully nonfunctional eyes, chilling in the strawberry fields which he, unfortunately, will not be able to observe. Of course living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding’s all you see, but what if the misunderstanding becomes fucking annoying and you have completely no power over it?  
  
I remember when I just lost my sight, people said I was brave. But in what universe is this bravery? I didn’t choose to be blind; I wake up every day and live my life the way fate wants me to live it. You don’t call a man brave for having two functional eyes, right? That’s just the way he is, and blind is just the way I am.


	3. How about you look at me when I speak?

I can only imagine what this place looks like. The walls are probably painted white with small cracks in them, and there is a small round glass table set between two leather armchairs. The leather is most likely red and is designed to look like crocodile skin. Crocodile skin makes everything look expensive and noble, it would fit well here.  
  
That’s what I’ve always imagined a therapist office to look like, but from the poor acoustics I can tell there’s way more furniture here than I assumed. This guy probably has shelves with his golden awards sitting on them like any good, straight-forward doctor does. “Look at how good I am, I fixed so many poor lost souls!” he tells each of his patients, grinning and motioning his hand towards the packed shelves. “Aren’t I just great?”  
  
Yes, my mom did, after all, drag me to a fucking hospital which I most definitely and utterly do not need. But my mom and I don’t share opinions.  
  
Apparently I’m so worried about my physical disability that she chose to sign me up for a meeting with an experienced therapist. And by “a meeting” she most certainly meant “every thursday for the next ten weeks until she sees improvement in my state”.  
  
Probably the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard since I lost my eyesight. I am perfectly normal, at least mentally. She has no idea what she’s talking about, but she sure thinks differently.  
  
It’s been ten years since I went blind, and only now she suddenly decides that there’s perhaps something wrong with me. Yeah, sure, I’ve never gotten self-destructing panic attacks or major depression fits that could alarm her, but she really should have tried getting me help sooner. She should have done this when I actually gave a shit and had some hope for the future left. Now that it’s gone, I frankly could not care less about what happens to me. Why do I need to be in the right state of mind if I’m never going to be able to make anything of my life anyways? Really, mom could have locked me down in the basement for several months and no one would bat an eye. “Oh? You had a son? Gerald, his name was?” our neighbors would say after she asked them if they’d noticed anything.  
  
I told my mom all of this, but all she said was “oh baby, mother knows her child better than the child knows itself, I can see how much you’re struggling”. After that I decided to just go with the flow. It’s pointless, arguing with my mom. She hardly ever listens, and when she does, she always finds some sad, hidden and totally unnecessary meaning behind my words. Apparently I don’t know myself well enough to know what’s best for me- staying at home or talking to some stuck-up therapist, laying my soul out for him. Mom says that I only think everything is okay with me because I’m blindfolded by my deep deep depression, while in reality I’m slowly drowning in my own sorrow for myself.  
  
But I’ve already accepted that I’m blind! Why does she have to pour salt on the almost healed wound?  
  
I understand that she just wants for me to get better, but I feel fine! I AM fine! Sometimes I feel like… I feel like she’s hiding something from me, and it’s irritating, confusing and kind of scary.  
  
She is now sitting by me on the leather couch, and the therapist is gone off to the bathroom. Her sweaty, cold and bony hand is tightly gripping mine, and it looks like she’s even more nervous than I am. Her sharp nails are digging painfully into my skin, but I don’t pull away: she needs a relief.  
  
Suddenly I hear the door crack open and heavy footsteps enter the room. Here it comes. They move slowly and lazily, as if the person could not care less about what happens in the next hour. Just like me.  
  
“Ah, hello Mr Ackermann!” my mother chirps out two seconds later. That’s a German name. The heavy footsteps approach the opposite side of the table and I hear the leather armchair squeak under the weight of the therapist.  
  
“Hallo, Mrs Way,” he greets back in a thick German accent, singing out the vowels. His voice is unnaturally high for a male and, if my guess is right and he is a heavy man, he looks quite funny when he speaks. Like a huge wild bear with a voice of a five year old. “Hallo, Gerard,” he addresses me.  
  
I only nod in reply. I want him to see how much I look down to him, and that I don’t need his help at all. I’m going to be stubborn with him.  
  
Suddenly mom grabs my elbow and stretches my arm out in his direction. Before I can struggle away I feel the man’s dry meaty hand come in contact with mine as he shakes it.  
  
“It’s very nice to meet you,” Mr Ackermann adds, probably waiting for me to respond. Silence falls upon us, and I hear my mom’s nervous breathes. Honestly, I feel very sorry for her. raising a blind son who is 24 years old and is supposedly deeply depressed must be hard.  
  
“Okay Gerard, let’s start by taking your glasses off,” he says, probably realising that I am not planning to reply.  
  
Oh hell no, anything but glasses!  
  
I over-fiercely shake my head in response. “Oh no, I can’t,” I mumble, tilting my head down.  
  
“Yes you can. It’s important for you to be open with me in order for this to work,”  
  
I hesitate, trying to fight over the urge of getting up and leaving the room. I never, not under any circumstances, take my glasses off. Mom softly nudges my side.  
  
“Do as the doctor says, sweetie,” she half-whispers and I sigh shakily, not daring to move. I feel her cold hand touch my temple as she slides the glasses off for me. As soon as they are off me, I suddenly I feel extremely exposed and unprotected, as if I’m in the middle of a sea filled with sharks, ready to attack me.  
  
“Good. Now lets start,” the therapist says and his hands clap together. An image of jiggling flesh flashes in my mind.  
  
“So what exactly are you worried about, Mrs Way?”  
  
Mom seems to hesitate for a moment before replying.  
  
“I’d much rather discuss this without Gerard in the room,”  
  
What?  
  
“Oh, I understand. Gerard, do you need help to get to the corridor?”  
  
“Oh no, he’ll be fine,” mom interrupts me before I have a chance to protest. She is literally going to be discussing me, and she wants me to leave? “Gerard, go,”  
  
I wordlessly stand up from the couch, feeling really stupid for some reason.  
  
“Can I have my glasses back?”  
  
“Yes,” Mr Ackermann replies instead of my mom. I feel the smooth cold surface of the glasses on my fingertips and hurriedly pull them out of mother’s grip. After I put them on I painfully slowly make my way outside, hoping that I won’t knock anything over. Finally, I’m outside the room, in the corridor. It’s filled with quiet murmurs of other patients, and I can practically feel all eyes pierce into me. They think I don’t know they’re staring, but I always do.  
  
Feeling around with my hands I find a chair and carefully sit down on it, trying to relax, but the peace just doesn’t come. I don’t know what to think or do- my mom just asked me to leave the room so that she can discuss my condition with that disgusting Mr Fucking Ackermann.  
  
“Hey Casanova!” a loud, slightly high-pitched male voice rings next to my left ear, waking me up. I panickly flinch away, startled, my heart racing in my chest. I face the direction where the voice is coming from just to be met with a sly chuckle, the type of giggle you’d expect to come from a witch's mouth.  
  
“Wearing glasses inside?” the voice asks playfully and I suddenly understand what the whole Casanova joke is about, and I honestly wish I didn’t. It makes me wonder if he realises that I’m blind or not, but I am not going to inquire. I wordlessly turn away, clenching my fist.  
  
“Dude, you awake?” I feel air being blown into my face and realise that he’s waving his hand in front of me.  
  
“Fuck off,” I mutter through gritted teeth.  
  
“Hey, I’m just trying to make a friend!”  
  
“I am not interested,”  
  
“What’s up your ass? Why the fuck are you wearing glasses?”  
  
And with those words, he does the forbidden: he rips my protectors and saviors right off my face.  
  
I continue to stare at the same spot in front of me, not acknowledging him even though I feel like I’m going to pass out any second. I feel ill and my brain is fuzzy with panic; I frankly wish I was dead.  
  
“Hey! How about you look at me when I speak?” the voice shouts over me and I sigh. Now he’s going to be the miserable one.  
  
I turn my head to face him and tilt my face upwards slightly, half closing my eyes.  
  
“I’m fucking blind, asshole,” I spit at him triumphantly.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, feedback please)


	4. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong

My words seem to have the desired effect on the guy as his voice noticeably quiets down. He chokes back an embarrassed gasp and his hand, which I haven’t even noticed before, leaves my forearm. I continue to stare in his direction, only hoping that my eyes are directed right at him. That way he’ll feel like I’m actually watching him.  
  
“Oh my god, I’m sorry,” he mutters out quickly and I feel the glasses being shoved harshly into my hands. I accept them, feeling as if I just won a battle. There is now a raspy note and a stutter in his voice, too. I achieved what I wanted, I made him feel like the last piece of shit in the world, and it feels great to be a winner. Especially if you just put down an asshole. The best fucking feeling in the world.  
  
“It’s alright,” I say, raising my chin upwards and turning my head to look ahead of me as if I’m utterly disgusted by the guy’s behavior. I’m going to milk as much profit from this as possible. I know I’m not being nice or respectful, but right now I could not care less. I’m angry. I’m angry, because my mother is hiding something from me. I’m angry, because this guy just ripped my glasses off me, calling me “Casanova”. I’m angry because I’m fucking blind and it’s being shoved into my face every five minutes. “Oh thank you, I forgot I was blind, thank you for a reminder, bless your beautiful soul,” - is that what they expect me to say every time they acknowledge my disability?  
  
“If I knew, I’d never-”  
  
“I said it’s alright, it’s not like it’s your fault anyway,” I cut him off simply, shrugging my shoulders like it’s no business.  
  
“Sorry,” he repeats again. I decide to ignore him completely, at least until he finds something better to talk about. Otherwise, I’m not interested.  
  
Sure, sometimes it’s good and even helpful to have someone to talk to, a friend you can trust, but I don’t want to repeat my old, unforgettable and disappointing experience. People are not nice, they are pathetic and ridiculous, skipping around in their nice-guy masks as if they are a part of a crazy ballet show. It’s all just a cover, no matter how much you try to convince yourself otherwise. People don’t change, and in order to survive you must always, always keep this in the back of your mind. All a human life consists of is a constant battle for dominance, for the throne on the top of the world which only the special ones get a chance to set their asses on. And in order to get to the top, you, of course, need to push someone off. They’ll slaughter anyone who stands in their way, they are unstoppable and not to be argued with, somewhat like tanks running over defenseless souldiers, who can do nothing but scream in agony. I’ve figured out long ago that the quiet, outcast kids are the sweetest. They are pure, innocent, and innocence is exactly what our society lacks.  
  
I personally find sickenly sweet pleasure in being alone; I love it dearly and hate it bitterly all at the same time. It’s really better to not overthink it, or you might as well lose your marbles. And then you have a trip to a mental institution guaranteed.  
  
Those who trust are the ones who die too early.  
  
Silence falls upon us, but it’s awkward only for him: I’m used to being quiet around people. I don’t even know they are next to me most of the time until they make attempts at communication, so I don’t mind this one bit.  
  
“So, what’s your name?” he asks hesitantly after a few minutes. Finally.  
  
“Gerard. You?”  
  
“Frank Iero. It’s nice to meet you,”  
  
I nod, turning to face the direction of his voice. I slid my glasses back on- he deserves a rest, and I’m actually set for a decent conversation.  
  
“Nice to meet you too, Frank,” I stretch my cracked dry lips out in a smile. As skin tears, I feel an irony taste of blood on the tip of tongue. I kind of like it. Not in the way you’d enjoy a glass of coke though.  
  
“...And you are here because?..” he asks. “Obviously you aren’t visiting a therapist because you’re blind?” he lets out a nervous chuckle which sounds more like an “eh”. To be honest, I’m glad he’s joking about it- people are usually not as brave and straight forward when it comes to this sort of things. Maybe it’s right, but I like it when people around me are more laid back.  
  
“I don’t know actually. My mom brought me here ‘cause she’s worried about something. She wanted to discuss it with the therapist without me in the room,” I scratch my palm. “And you?”  
  
“Um, I’m here to support someone,”  
  
“Really?”  
  
“Yeah. It’s a friend of mine. We aren’t that close, but right now he needs help more than ever,”  
  
It’s hard to admit, but Frank doesn’t seem horrible, he’s been decent so far. We fall silent again before Frank speaks up.  
  
“Hey, if you don’t mind me asking, how did you lose your sight?”  
  
“It was in a housefire about 10 years ago,” I reply. I remember when it just happened I used to tell long stories, but now I can hardly press out more than three words out of myself.  
  
“Wow,” he breathes out and for some reason he again rests his hand on my forearm, squeezing lightly. “Do you still remember what the world looks like?”  
  
“Kind of. I remember the sky, trees, mountains, houses and what people look like… I know what all colours look like, I can imagine them, if that makes sense,”  
  
“It does, really,” he assures me and I smile again.  
  
“Gerald?” Mr Ackermann’s voice suddenly calls out for me from a distance. My own therapist can’t say my name right, marvelous. “Gerald could you please come in?”  
  
Frank’s hand unwillingly slides off my arm.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Very short first chapter, tell me what you think


End file.
